1. Field of the Invention
The invention is in the field of telecommunication network control.
2. Description of the Background Art
Many locally managed telecommunication systems, such as PBXs, employ "least cost routing" software to reduce telecommunication costs. The system's manager arranges with more than one interexchange carrier to carry the system's traffic from the local exchange to which it is connected to other exchanges. The manager keeps track of each carrier's charges and populates the routing table in the "least cost routing" software. The charges may be the regularly tariffed charges of the subscriber's primary carrier or contracted charges offered by an alternate carrier for a bulk discount or for discounting traffic during a specific time period during the day. The "least cost routing" software will examine each call attempt and automatically decide which carrier is the best economic choice for that call. If the call attempt fails, the software usually defaults the call attempt to the subscriber's primary carrier.
Telecommunication carriers regularly enter into wholesale contractual arrangements with other carriers to use part or all of such other carriers' telecommunications networks, for example, to complete calls to geographic regions the first carrier does not serve or to provide additional capacity on routes, or portions of routes, for which the first carrier may have little or no available capacity on its own network facilities at that time.
Recently a great deal of competition has developed between telecommunication carriers. This has been stimulated by both regulatory and technological changes. As telecommunication becomes more of a commodity it would be of great benefit to consumers to stimulate this competition and facilitate both a carrier's and a consumer's ability to make economic choices between telecommunication carriers.
In the method and system of the invention disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,606,602, telecommunication switches route calls in accordance with economic incentives (e.g., least cost routing) resulting from a bidding process between participating telecommunication carriers (the "Carriers"), administered by a bidding service provider through operation of a central processor, a computer referred to as a bidding moderator (the "Moderator"). In that arrangement, each of the Carriers transmits to the Moderator the rate it is willing to charge (or other economic incentive it is willing to offer) for service between two specific points, from an originating point to a terminating point, at some particular time. The Moderator collects this bid information from all the Carriers, sorts it among originating points, and transmits it to each appropriate switch location and to participating Carriers' network management centers. Each subscribing switch (a "Subscriber") gets such information from the Moderator for all "point-to-point routes" originating in the Subscriber's local exchange area. The Moderator provides each Carrier with bid information from competing Carriers for all point-to-point routes for which any Carrier has submitted a bid (e.g., any NPA-NXX to any other NPA-NXX, or otherwise-defined telecommunications network destination, in the world). The Carriers receiving this information will have the opportunity thereafter to submit a lower or higher bid for any point-to-point routes on which they wish, respectively, to stimulate or discourage additional traffic. Through this bidding process, Carriers can compete for traffic on selected routes or compete for traffic originating from selected points in telecommunication networks. They can also manage their network traffic by adjusting their bids from time to time, depending on network traffic information or other network information.
The specification in U.S. Pat. No. 5,606,602 (starting on column 4, line 63 thereof) discloses in part the following:
The economic choices presented to telecommunication service users under this invention depend on bids submitted by Carriers for telecommunication traffic over the routes they serve. Each route is defined by the local exchange switch serving its originating point and the local exchange switch serving its terminating point. Each local exchange switch is identified in the North American Numbering Plan by a unique NPA-NXX code, where the NPA is a three digit numbering plan area identifier (e.g., area code 201 identifies Northern New Jersey) and NXX is a three digit code identifying a particular local exchange switch within the numbering plan area . . . The subscribing switch may also have dedicated direct links to one or more carrier points of presence. If such a carrier is selected, the subscribing switch would route the call attempt directly to that link. While the currently predominant numbering scheme for network switching end points is the North American Numbering Plan, other numbering schemes identifying route originating points and terminating points are possible and may be used as telecommunication technology evolves.
In the disclosed architecture a "route" is defined by the network switching end point serving the originating point of such route and the network switching end point serving the terminating point of such route. Network switching end points can be referred to as local exchange switches. A local exchange switch (or equivalent local switching node) is generally considered to be (i) the switching point on a telecommunications network that serves as the most immediate switching interface between the calling party and that telecommunications network as well as (ii) the switching point on a telecommunications network (which may, but need not be, owned or operated by the same carrier who owns or operates the originating switching point) that serves as the most immediate switching interface between the called party and that telecommunications network, regardless of whether such telecommunications networks use circuit-switched, frame relay, asynchronous transfer mode, packet data, TCP/IP protocols or other current or evolving telecommunication technologies. Local exchange switches (or equivalent local switching nodes), for example, may include telephone companies' local central office switches, private telecommunications networks' local access nodes, and Internet service providers' local access switches--whether represented by a server, router or other switching device (which may be hardware or software-defined), but in each case providing access to the respective telecommunications network. These network switching end points define a "route" for which Carriers can submit bids to the Moderator as described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,606,602, in order to compete to provide service to end users attempting to make calls over such routes.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,606,602 further discloses that a subscribing switch (e.g., a PBX) may also have dedicated direct links to one or more Carrier points of presence and, if such a Carrier is selected to carry a specific call, the subscribing switch would route the call attempt directly to that dedicated direct link (without, for example, being handled by the local exchange switch that may otherwise serve that subscribing switch).
Carriers may submit bids for route segments to the Moderator for different types of telecommunications networks (e.g., circuit-switched, frame relay, asynchronous transfer mode, packet data networks such as the Internet, etc.) and for different classes of telecommunications service provided by such networks (e.g., transmission of voice, data, video, etc.). Access to such telecommunications networks or facilities by end users or by other telecommunications carriers or service providers may be, for example, via the public switched telephone network, dedicated facilities, private lines, wireless facilities, coaxial cable, electric utility power lines, Ethernet or other local area network (LAN), metropolitan area network (MAN) or wide area network (WAN) connections.